Income from oil and gas is just a fraction of the Scottish economy, so don’t believe those who say we’ll be crippled by the current price slump
To observe the joy unconfined that greets each fresh tumble in oil prices is to be present at the birth of a new parlour game. Let’s call it Banana Republic, in which the contestants vie with each other to predict the economy of which country Scotland’s would most have resembled if she had gained her independence. Amid braying and snorting and shouts of “Central African Republic” and “Malawi” the winner would be the chap who could name the most colourful-sounding poor nation that existed in his imagination. And then someone would say: “Would the last person to leave the country please turn out the light. Oscar Wilde said that.”
As BP announced last week that it was to lay off hundreds of workers in its North Sea fields owing to the continued downturn in oil prices the usual suspects went into meltdown. There were two competing reactions: sympathy and concern for the families of those made redundant by their multibillion global super company and sheer delight at the prospect of giving the Nationalists a right good kicking. By the end of the week, those espousing the latter sentiment in Scotland had won easily. Many Scottish Labour figures, all of whom ought to have known better, were in the latter camp and that is why their party won’t have enough MSPs to run a coconut shy after the Holyrood elections.
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